This invention relates to an automatic fishing gut binding machine.
In the fishing industry, since long ago and up to the present, fish have been caught in large quantities through the use of nets, rods, and extended lines. This has been the situation in Japan as well as in most countries of the world. Recently, there have been large numbers of requests for the use of extended lines and rods rather than the use of nets due to the value of the captured fish, demands for the protection of natural resources, and other reasons. Due to these factors, but primarily due to economic demand, the fishing industry based on the use of extended lines has been flourishing. This is the case where rods are used but it is also particularly true where extended lines are employed. These extended lines, or main fishing lines, are comprised of a number of elongated (extended) fishing lines, large quantities of fishing gut and fishhooks. Fishhooks in large quantities are tied to the fishing gut, and a large number of the fishing gut with attached fishhooks are, in turn, attached to each of the main extended fishing lines.
The above operation may involve a "short" main fishing line of about 3 km in length, or a "long" fishing line of about 15 km in length. If a length of fishing gut with hooks attached to it (hooked fishing gut) is tied to the main fishing line at intervals of about 30 to 50 cm, an immense amount of time and labor is required to complete this job over the usable length of the fishing line. Up until now, the work of binding fishhooks to fishing gut and then tying the hooked fishing gut to the main fishing line has been done completely by hand.
On days when they do not go out to sea, fishermen and their families attach by hand, one at a time, fishhooks to the fishing gut, making large quantities of hooked fishing gut. Then they take the lines of hooked fishing gut (these are of course much shorter than the main fishing line) and bind them, one at a time, to the main fishing line at fixed intervals. Depending upon the kind of fish to be caught, and the length of the main fishing line, it often requires over a month's time to make a single main fishing line. In addition, in order to attach the fishhooks to the fishing gut to form hooked fishing gut and, in turn, to attach the hooked fishing gut to the main fishing line at the given intervals, considerable skill is required. Women, children and inexperienced individuals generally do not do the binding job skillfully. In fact, even for skilled fishermen, the job of tying hooked fishing gut to several kilometers of a main fishing line is a major operation requiring an extraordinary amount of time.
In addition, depending on the type of fish to be caught, fishhooks must be bound firmly to the fishing gut, and likewise, the hooked fishing gut must be firmly tied to the main fishing line. A substantial amount of skill and physical strength is required for this work. For women, children, and novices, this labor is difficult. Moreover, because the fishhooks are of different sizes and shapes, some even quite large, occasionally injuries occur whereby the fishhook tip, or an inverted fishhook, pierces someone's hands or fingers. There is also the case when an individual is unaccustomed to the handling of the fishing hooks and fishing gut. At such times, fishing gut and lines become entangled, causing not only inconvenience, but sometimes even injury.
An object of the present invention is to provide a machine for tying string to fishhooks, rope, or other line. A further object is to provide such a machine which is particularly useful for tying fishing gut to fishhooks and for tying the resulting hooked fishing gut to the main fishing line.